In early 2022, Microsoft will bring seat-based Microsoft 365 cloud offers to New Commerce Experience (NCE) with general availability in the partner-led channel. A step ahead, CloudBlue currently powers Microsoft NCE transactions through our platform. We’re also working hard to support any additional Microsoft changes in the future.
To help you prepare for these changes and begin transacting Microsoft 365 in NCE when you’re ready, let’s dive into what these changes are, what they mean for your business and how you can begin selling Microsoft NCE to generate more revenue.
Microsoft NCE: Expanding to include new solutions
Microsoft NCE was first introduced in 2019 with Azure to improve alignment across all licensing channel motions through a single-offer catalog, a common price list and monthly calendar invoice periods. In the latest version, available through CloudBlue with worldwide general availability set for early 2022, Microsoft will include seat-based cloud offers for Microsoft 365, Office 365, Dynamics 365, Power Platform, Enterprise Mobility + Security and Windows 365.
Understanding the changes coming to Microsoft NCE
Microsoft NCE helps partners create more customer-centric solutions. The changes include:
- New subscription commitment term options
In addition to annual commitments, there are new monthly committed term offers with a 20% price premium for customers who need term and seat-count flexibility.
Microsoft is introducing three-year committed term options for Dynamics 365 now and for other product groups coming soon.
Attach Offers may be acquired by customers independent of Base Offers, so long as dependencies are satisfied.
- Consistent cancellation policies
All NCE offers will share the same Cancellation Policy of up to 72 hours to reverse new seat commitments.
Partners may plan ahead by disabling Auto-Renewal for the committed term end.
- Easier subscription management
For most offers, notably excluding small-to-medium business (SMB) and Windows offers, there is an option to blend subscriptions with short and long-term commitments for customers with seasonal or business-volume fluctuations.
Subscription ownership enforcement automatically prevents customers from acquiring multiple purchases of free trials and promotions and small-to-medium business (SMB) offers from different partners or licensing motions.
- Promotions
Microsoft will automatically apply any eligible promotion to orders.
Microsoft will introduce an ability to verify promotion eligibility near order time.
How will Microsoft NCE impact your business?
With additional Microsoft 365 solutions added to Microsoft NCE, partners will benefit from greater standardization of offer terms, invoicing and policies. This will give customers greater choice and flexibility in how and where they buy these solutions from value-adding partners as pricing is consistent across licensing motions such as Microsoft Direct. This will allow partners to differentiate through value-adds and afford the opportunity to sell and upsell to a larger set of existing and new customers.
CloudBlue: Powering NCE for our customers
Our CloudBlue technology is integrated with the Microsoft NCE platform. We support automated ordering of the NCE offers in the current Technical Preview release, and we support all Microsoft 365 paid and trial offers available today in the NCE catalog. CloudBlue is used exclusively to manage the offers catalog and integrate with Microsoft NCE. And our investments in product catalog automation tools can make offers available to your business rapidly and correctly.
Accelerating growth with Microsoft NCE changes
As a result of the changes to Microsoft NCE, it’s never been easier to seamlessly create more customer-centric solutions. For more information and to better understand Microsoft NCE changes, contact us at together@CloudBlue.com.
